Sinister !

[Meikai]

C'est pour mieux te faire saliver

[Chernabog]

C'est souvent les films de ce genre qui sortent en décalé maintenant je crois remarquer...

[Duramou]

C'est pour mieux te faire saliver

Je n'ai rien d'autre à dire que

8-)

[Duramou]

C'est souvent les films de ce genre qui sortent en décalé maintenant je crois remarquer...

Pas faux !
En tout cas, de bonnes critiques arrivent et j'attends les retours de la projection londonienne de vendredi

Every year at SXSW there is one screening that generates a buzz throughout the festival and that is the Super Secret Midnight Screening. What exactly is the screening? No one knows until the film actually starts. This year it was anyones guess. People thought it would be The Avengers since Joss Whedon was in town, others felt it would be Wrath of the Titans, I personally thought it was going to be Hunger Games, but like usual, we were all wrong and it was actually a horror film staring Ethan Hawke called Sinister. The crazy thing was that they only let about 105 badge holders into the screening so it made seeing the film that much more exclusive.

Sinister was co-written by C.Robert Cargill from Ain’t it Cool News and Scott Derrickson who also directed the film. The basic premise of the film is simply ”Whatever happens to the guy who finds the elusive found footage?” and Sinister tells us just that. The film really goes back to the basic of the classic horror genre and focuses on the creepiness of dark houses, strange noises and mind tricks.

In Sinister, true crime writer Ellison (Ethan Hawke), moves his wife and two kids into a new home that was previously the sight of a gruesome homicide/kidnapping/missing person. The reason he moves to this house is because he is having financial problems and hasn’t been able to deliver a solid book since his last hit years ago. He decides on this house as an attempt to use the gruesome history as the subject for his new book. Once settled into the home, strange things begin to happen to pretty much everyone in the house. Ellison soon finds a box in the attic with an old film projector and a few home movies with different dates on them. In hopes of learning about the prior family and what happened, Ellison begins watching the films which show the family and their horrific deaths. After watching the first film, he soon realizes that each films show a different family and how they were murdered. Ellison soon begins researching the connections between the families and soon learns the shocking connection between them.

Sinister was hands down the scariest and most shocking film I have seen in quite sometime. Anytime you have creepy little kids, you have the ability to scare the shit out of people. Though the film was shot on a very low budget, the execution and score give it a blockbuster horror feel. The interesting thing about the film was that Cargill stated during the Q&A that he had a nightmare about the opening sequence and that he found that footage in a box up in an attic. Once you see the film, you will realize, the dude has some pretty F’ed up dreams.

Overall the film was a huge surprise to myself who went in with no expectations at all. When the film comes out in October, I wouldn’t be surprised at all if it killed it at the box office. This film will give you nightmares and stay in your mind for days to come. I strongly recommend any fan of horror films or anyone who wants a great original shock film to see Sinister. You will never guess that this was Ethan Hawke’s first horror film, based on his performance.

Rating: Original horror film that will leave you with many sleepless nights. 9/10

[Duramou]

It is no surprise to me that the film’s opening sequence was born of a nightmare visited upon co-writer C. Robert Cargill, because Sinister is the stuff bad dreams are made of. It has a flair for imagery and unnerving conceptualizations of evil that will have you convinced you are being dangled precariously over the licking flames of perdition. With each new Super 8 reel examined, a progressively darker and more upsetting parade of infamy creeps into your eye sockets and takes root in your brain; seared into your consciousness forevermore. Comparisons will be made to Jigsaw, and this is a fallacy. At least with Jigsaw, the victims always had a chance.

But Sinister‘s greatest strength is also the spotlight for what I feel is its biggest flaw. The prevalence of jump scares in the film is formidable and while most are admittedly well-earned, those that aren’t only highlight the lack of substance inherent in this genre ploy. Granted, I’m aware that this is a nitpick of an artistic nature and one rooted in personal taste. Despite how much they may irk me, jump scares sell and will probably net a few more shrieks of elation, and thus extra dollars, from the general multiplex rabble. I also have serious issues with the score both on a sensory level and as it betrays the film thematically. The score is a series of foreboding basement beats intermixed with eerily vague soundbites of screaming, disembodied speech, and even bestial growls. These discordant notes are at their most frenzied while Ellison watches the films from the attic. Problem is, these are Super 8 films with no sound so immediately we know they aren’t the product of those films. But the score becomes so awkwardly overwhelming as to sound like it’s actually present in the room and it becomes unclear whether the character should be hearing it or whether it is in his head. It overpowers its own iconic imagery and that is a real shame. I was not at all astounded to find out after the fact that the composer here was Christopher Young, who also did the music for Drag Me To Hell; in which he also seemed more interested in assaulting eardrums than underscoring the creepy visuals.

My only other real complaint with Sinister is that the third act surprises are not as shocking as they are built up to be. Don’t get me wrong, they aren’t cheap, and they are totally informed by the context of the film’s earlier events. And yet if you pay attention to what you’re seeing but at all, they will seem exceptionally obvious. To its credit, Sinister actually gets a lot of traction out of that reveal once the thin curtain is pulled back, and honestly the reveals are secondary to the events that play out in the first two acts. I’m also not a huge fan of how the wife character is handled; casually threatening to take Ellison’s children away as if she’s reminding him that there is dry cleaning to be picked up. I understand her motivations for having doubts about their marriage, but her threat comes so out of the blue as to so sound malicious in a way that makes that character unsympathetic.

Apart from those quibbles, Sinister is a damn good horror film that will play to ravenously appreciative crowds in October. It isn’t just haunting, it’s terror that is gripping to the point of being asphyxiating, yet so much fun you’ll be cheering with every gasp.

Grade: A-

[Duramou]

Un site américain, en partenariat avec de petites salles a crée un site pour pouvoir voir Sinister en avant première. Le film sera diffusé à Atlanta avant le reste des autres villes et certaines réactions énervées de spectateurs pressés de voir "Le meilleur film d'horreur de la décennie", ont particiipé à cette manifestation. Il faut s'inscrire sur ce site et suivant le nombre d'inscrits, le film sera projeté en avance pendant une semaine.

[phoenlx]

Il est si révolutionnaire que ça ce film ? Sur quoi tout le monde se base pour parler du meilleur film d'horreur de la décennie, alors que personne ne l'a vu ?
L'horreur en plus c'est subjectif je ne sais pas trop si on peut prévoir à l'avance si les effets capteront le public ou pas, c'est un peu comme l'humour et les comédies, je suis dubitatif ( souvent ce genre de films font le buzz quand on s'y attend pas trop ) mais j'avoue être enthousiaste aussi en voyant les bandes annoncé ... Mais le meilleur film de la décennie ils y vont fort

[Duramou]

Il est si révolutionnaire que ça ce film ? Sur quoi tout le monde se base pour parler du meilleur film d'horreur de la décennie, alors que personne ne l'a vu ?
L'horreur en plus c'est subjectif je ne sais pas trop si on peut prévoir à l'avance si les effets capteront le public ou pas, c'est un peu comme l'humour et les comédies, je suis dubitatif ( souvent ce genre de films font le buzz quand on s'y attend pas trop ) mais j'avoue être enthousiaste aussi en voyant les bandes annoncé ... Mais le meilleur film de la décennie ils y vont fort

Franchement, ce genre d'affirmation me fiche la trouille. Ca sent le buzz à plein nez et me fait craindre le pire.
Si ! Beaucoup de gens l'ont vu. Dans des festivals divers consacrés au genre. C'est ce qui fait que je cherche les différentes critiques.
Bref...

[Duramou]

Eh ! Merci à qui a corrigé ma bourde !

Encore de bons échos sur le film !
Je vais arrêter de me renseigner car je vais finir par être contaminée, trop en attendre et être déçue même si c'est un bon film.

[phoenlx]

Oui c'est toujours le piège quand on est à fond dans les news avant ( j'ai l'impression que cet été certains ont été déçus par Batman pour ça, et moi je sens que ça risque de m'arriver avec The hobbit vu comment je suis à fond dans le projet depuis 3-4 ans

[Duramou]

En ce qui concerne, ce n'est pas mon cas. J'ai aimé le TDK et pas du tout TDKR alors que je n'étais pas du tout, comme je te l'avais dit, spécialement impatiente. En partie à cause de Marion mais ce n'est qu'un détail parmi les autres énormes boulettes et manquements scénaristiques.

[phoenlx]

sûr que le film était pas révolutionnaire, mais j'en attendais pas grand chose perso ; ça reste mieux qu'avengers c'est déjà ça

[Duramou]

Il paraît que le film a été le clou du festival Frightfest 2012 !

A mainstream horror well made, Sinister is always compelling and frequently unnerving. It won’t send you screaming from your house but you’ll exit the multiplex on a Friday night with a smile on your face, contented and disquieted.

[Duramou]

Sinister
Another film to receive excellent advance word from previous festival screenings, Sinister comes from the mind of writer C Robert Cargill and director Scott Derrickson (The Exorcism of Emily Rose). As a relatively big-budget American horror, Sinister took many jaded horror fans at the festival by surprise in just how effective it was in building its atmosphere of dread and pure fear - reducing one of the hardest-to-scare audiences in the world being at certain points into jumpy, quivering wrecks.

Expertly directed by Derrickson with a knowing, surprisingly funny script, Sinister lets you know from its haunting, disturbing opening moments that this is not your to be average supernatural haunted house movie. The central conceit is clever and well-executed, Ethan Hawke is typically excellent as a dangerously obsessed writer investigating increasingly horrific crimes , and the unusually abstract and ambient soundtrack does much to intensify the suffocating atmosphere. With some of the best-crafted shocks in years, Sinister is not to be missed by anyone who likes their horror to actually be scary, and looks set to emulate Insidious as a potentially huge word-of-mouth hit.


4/5
Sinister will be released in the UK on October 5.

[Duramou]

[Duramou]

A new horror flick that somehow finds a way to make even the oldest ides fresh again is, most likely, a pretty solid horror flick -- and when you're talking about scary movies that are best described as "haunted house stories," you damn well better find a new angle. Who the hell needs yet another generic haunted house story? Recent offerings like Paranormal Activity and Insidious have found several ways to make haunted houses seem fresh and novel again, and now the producers of those films are back with yet another low-budget, high-concept example of how, in the horror biz, sometimes the oldest ideas are the coolest ones.

Co-written and directed by Scott Derrickson (The Exorcism of Emily Rose), the surprisingly low-key and admirably intense Sinister is just a bad-ass little horror flick. It's not a fast-paced powerhouse action-fest, nor is it a dry and dreary exercise in creaking doors and rattled minds. It's just a slick and smart little campfire story, cleverly conceived, handsomely presented, and quietly creepy. (Derrickson's co-writer on Sinister is C. Robert Cargill, a guy I've known for years, and a guy who knows his horror.) What I like most about Sinister is that the producers probably could have made it for half the cost; it's a movie that offers creepy ideas in quiet ways, and is not interested in explosions, geysers of gore, or a big third act mayhem crescendo. It's just old-school creepy.

Ethan Hawke (really strong here) plays a "true crime" author who has dragged his wife and two young children to the site of a horrific quadruple murder. Yes, the author actually buys the house where four people were killed so he can write a book about the killings. Oh, and he hasn't told his wife about the house's disturbing history. And that's not the last mistake that the desperate but well-meaning Ellison will make regarding his new home. Toss in a local sheriff who detests the author for his own reasons, a slow-witted deputy who might not be so clueless, and a helpful yet weird college professor who deals with the occult, and you're already halfway to a creepy movie.

Ah, but there's also the mysterious box of film reels that Ellison finds in his attic. He moved into this house to get to the truth of the murders -- and now, as he spins all five reels of horrific carnage -- he's about to get a lot more truth than he expected. Turns out there's more going on than just one murdered family, and it's not pretty.

Impressive in its restraint at its quieter moments, and powerfully disturbing at its nastiest, Sinister is a framework that's old, a concept that's new, and a darkly entertaining terror tale on the whole. Hawke's strong performance sells the "otherworldly" material as a strong counterweight, and the lovely Juliet Rylance has some great moments of her own. Character actors like Fred Dalton Thompson (as the sheriff) and Vincent D'Onofrio (as the professor) add some color to the procedural moments, but it's Hawke's movie, truth be told.

Impressively shot with dark shadows and moody lighting by Chris Norr and set to a strange but effective score by Christopher Young, Sinister may not be the kind of movie to spawn another Saw or Paranormal Activity franchise, but that hardly matters to passionate horror fans. One wonders if a smart and generally quiet horror movie will find an audience these days, but if advertising can trick people into paying money for crap like The Devil Inside, it should be able to do so for quality like Sinister. This is simply a cool new idea wedged into a familiar setting, and the result is a slightly sedate but consistently creepy little horror flick that has a few new wrinkles to offer, and it does so in cool and confident fashion. I believe I already mentioned "creepy."

8,5/10

[Duramou]

Review: Sinister / Cert: 15 / Director: Scott Derrickson / Screenplay: Scott Derrickson / Starring: Ethan Hawke, Juliet Rylance, James Ransone / Release Date: October 5th

The crown for the scariest film of the year previously won by Insidious is now in the hands of Sinister which manages to create a crowd pleasing, effective horror film as well as giving us a boogieman for the new generation.

True crime writer Ellison (Ethan Hawke) moves his family to a small town following up the disappearance of a young girl and hoping to score another best seller in the process. Unbeknownst to his family they move to the exact house where the girl’s family was executed before she vanished. Everything appears normal until Ellison finds a box of super 8 home movies in the attic which show the family being murdered as well as other families sometimes decades apart. Through research he finds out that each executed family also had a young child that disappeared. Careful examination also reveals the presence of a dark, malevolent figure in the footage. Ellison becomes obsessed and his obsession puts his own family in danger.

Two things combine to make Sinister the scariest film for a while. One is Scott Derrickson’s gift for presenting us with a surreal and disturbing image which he showed he could do in The Exorcism of Emily Rose, Sinister is full of weird moments, the appearance of ‘Mr Boogie’ in a pool being one of them as well as the scene where the ghostly children dance around Ellison as he investigates a bump in the night. The other is the fact that home movies in and of themselves are inherently creepy especially in this day and age of programs like ‘Ghosts caught on camera’ you can’t help but look for something weird every time a projector is fired up. This would usually be enough for me to give a horror film a pass but then Derrickson paces his movie extremely well, building a palpable sense of dread and malevolence whilst never really leaving the single house location. There are jump scares here which are not telegraphed and never cheap and they work perfectly in the context of the film.

The film also has several moments of levity which are surprisingly hilarious with lots of great dialogue and character moments to make this an overall crowd pleaser. The film’s score is also worthy of mention, Christopher Young composes a score that is so different from any other score for a horror movie I can remember, it’s full of weird little electronic and vocal flourishes and really adds to the overall feel of the piece.

As good as the cast are the only bum note is Juliet Rylance as Ellison’s wife. She seems miscast and when delivering her lines doesn’t really convince. This is a minor complaint though as Sinister is one of the year’s best horror films and the beginning of a franchise that should run and run.
Actual Rating:

[Duramou]

FrightFest 2012: Sinister
Reviews This nice balance between wry genre observation and old-fashioned fear is thanks to screenwriter C. Robert Cargill.
Posted 30th August 2012, 9:29am in Film, by Becky Reed





The biggest surprise of FrightFest 2012 ended up being a mainstream US horror. With a Hollywood star and dabbling in those tired-old tropes found-footage and possession, it ended up being one of the most genuinely pant-wettingly scary films in recent years - the unsubtle Woman in Black has nothing on this.

Scott Derrickson (The Exorcism of Emily Rose) begins his film with the most arresting opening scene screened all weekend, a real blood-curdler shot in grainy Super 8 - kudos for appearing in a film rated 15. It's a fantastic statement of intent, and the chills do not let up from that moment.

Cut to Ethan Hawke - an underrated actor who elevates most films up a notch - as true crime writer Ellison, moving his family into a downsized home as he works on the follow-up to his best-selling "Kentucky Blood". His presence irritates the local police force, who feel his work undermines their own, and things get off to a frosty start for the family, consisting of supportive wife Tracy (acclaimed stage actress Juliet Rylance, using her own accent), their chirpy daughter Ashley (Clare Foley) and emo son Trevor (Michael Hall D'Addario).

Unbeknownst to Tracy and the kids, their new home has a horrible past, but - lo! - it's not a haunted house story. The terror comes from the box of home movie reels Ellison finds in the attic, which he watches aghast in his office/FBI-style evidence room. Pertinent to his new project, the films haunt him as the family become increasingly disturbed by the obvious tension in the house - Trevor's night terrors lead to one stunningly staged fright. Ellison is portrayed as a vain opportunist without regard for the comfort of his family, and the fact that the kids have often stumbled upon his gruesome research is a major theme.

It's all about those home movies though, with Sinister bringing us the best of found-footage. Morbidly titled as Family BBQ and the like, they show the happy families going about their business before cutting to abject scenes of slaughter. Ellison's fascination with the footage and determination to solve the mystery of these serial slayings are evocative of the peerless Manhunter, proving Sinister is no bog standard horror. Derrickson does throw in plenty of classic jump scares, but they are filmed with panache and don't ever feel cheap.

Its class is proven by the introduction of "Deputy So and So", one of the funniest supporting characters of the year. The droll voice of audience reason, the initially fawning cop sends up Ellison's reactions through the eyes of the viewer. Played with flawless deadpan delivery from The Wire and Generation Kill's James Ransone, it's a potentially dangerous shift in tone, but provides some much-needed relief during the nerve-shredding moments.

This nice balance between wry genre observation and old-fashioned fear is thanks to screenwriter C. Robert Cargill, aka Ain't It Cool News film critic Massawyrm, making his debut. Speaking on stage at FrightFest, his obvious heartfelt passion for horror is key to Sinister's success. The smart, faithful script is like a companion piece to Joss Whedon and Drew Goddard's The Cabin in the Woods, but less loving hate letter to horror and more loving romantic letter that celebrates and rejoices in all that is good.

The only thing that can be criticised is the eventual manifestation of the evil, after the creepy-as-hell teases, and the subsequent events. It's where Sinister veers from the familiar but fresh approach to slightly cheesy territory, but that's small fry when your nails have already been bitten to the quick. A superior horror, one that is more effective than the similarly-toned, terrific Insidious. Be warned - the trailer ruins a lot of the shocks, so avoid like the plague.

Rating: 9/10

[Duramou]

Sinister is a clever little chiller that seems to be heading one way and then takes you in a quite different, and much nastier, direction.

Hawke stars as Ellison Oswald, a writer of true-life crime novels who has just moved with his family – wife Tracy, son Trevor and daughter Ashley – to a house where he plans to work on his next book. What his family don't know is that the house they have moved into was the scene of a grisly murder that is at the core of Ellison's new book. A family was found hanged from a tree in the backyard, and one of the daughters went missing.

The film takes a clever “found footage” turn when Ellison comes across a box of Super 8 films, and a projector, in the attic. What the box contains are a film of the murder in the house … and four other murders as well. The murders have taken place in different locations across the US, and at different times – often decades apart. And, it seems, the murders are all somehow connected.

So yes, it's a found footage film. Kind of. But don't despair; this is not a film about the people in, the footage, but rather about the man who finds the footage, And what then happens to him, and the people he loves. It's also a clever, fresh take on the haunted house film - there are plenty of creaks and bangs in the night that will get you jumping out of your seat - and the serial killer drama. And even the much-maligned “boogeyman” film. So yes, it takes a few classic horror movie tropes and dusts them of, gives them a fresh lick of paint and gives you a very scary film with tons of drama and suspense.

Hawke is terrific in the lead role of a writer obsessed with having another hit book on his hands; a man obsessed with making a living and caring for his family, while also trying to get to the bottom of this decades-old mystery. He's a man haunted by the awful killings he witnesses in films, yet he must keep them to himself. Yet his family is affected – son Trevor is having night terrors; talented Ashley is painting pictures from the films. And wife Tracy is terrified of what is happening to her husband as he throws himself deeper and deeper into the project.

Sinister sneaks up on you, and punches you in the back of the head. With a block of ice. It's a film that takes you places you really don't want to go, and leaves a very nasty impression. And it has a finale that you just won't see coming. Highly recommended

4/5

[Duramou]

As part of MTV's Fall Movie Preview, we recently brought you an excerpt of our conversation with Ethan Hawke about his upcoming horror movie, "Sinister." The talk covered a range of topics, including Hawke's fear of making scary movies and being able to premiere the film in his hometown of Austin, Texas, during South by Southwest.

Here is our complete Q&A with Ethan Hawke about "Sinister."

MTV News: The thing I always wonder when I'm watching these movies and I'm uncomfortable watching it is does any of that suspense leak through to when you're actually filming a scene?

Ethan Hawke: You know, I really believe that's why for years I never wanted to make one of these movies is because I thought it would be absolutely terrifying to make it. But the irony is of course that it's incredibly fun to make it. It's kind of like telling a ghost story at midnight with a bunch of friends. You just laugh a lot and it seems really silly. I just had a great time making it. I'm not really one of those mad enthusiasts of the genre. I like certain scary movies that are good, but, I don't know, it just was silly and fun.

MTV: Like you said, you don't have a ton of experience with the genre. Do you find that making a movie that is horror, that that on-set experience is different than making any other film or even a genre film?

Hawke: No, it's all the same stuff, if you're working with a filmmaker that's talented and knows the architecture of film and knows how to tell a story. In a way, there is a real discipline to making these movies. It's like a comedy. It's all about the timing and the math of it. What makes something spooky and what makes something cheesy and stupid is a razor's edge. So that was the fun of it for me. This guy Scott Derrickson had made an incredibly scary film called "The Exorcism of Emily Rose," and I met him and it was kind of obvious to me that he was a real filmmaker and he knew how to do it and he wanted somebody to give a performance in his film and I wanted to do that. I don't know jack sh-- about making something scary, but we did.

MTV: So the centerpiece of this movie and where a lot of the scares come from revolve around these home videotapes. Is that something that was prepared beforehand that you were able to see before acting out the scenes where your character is watching those?

Hawke: Yeah, absolutely. You know, I'm sitting there watching them, so a lot of them were shot beforehand.

MTV: There are a lot of layers to "Sinister." It's not just a straight horror movie. It's about a character who is actually watching these scary movies and also creating these stories. Is this movie about horror movies in that way?

Hawke: That's the reason why I did it. The layers of it are so interesting. On one level, it's about a guy who puts his work ahead of his family; it's a simple moral tale, on that level. Then on another level, it's about the dangers of watching horror films, that somewhere inside the film itself is something dangerous to you, which is really subversive and f---ed up and interesting. I really like that. That's what made the movie appealing to me.

MTV: There are aspects of "Sinister" that are old-school horror movie. It's a character drama. This is a messed-up family in the middle of it, but it's also this character watching this found footage. Where do you think this falls in the genre? Is "Sinister" new-school or old?

Hawke: Well, I worked on it, so I love it. I think it falls in this really interesting mix of normal activity with "The Shining." It's some kind of weird found-footage movie that also is very classically built, classically told. But I'm not the judge of that — it sounds like I'm just pimping the movie out. What I loved about it is strictly from a straight-up acting point of view was to have such a complicated character. He's a character that is both — you know, he's several things at one time, as opposed to normally in these movies you're the good guy, you're the bad guy. This guy's some kind of crazy hodgepodge.

MTV: So "Sinister" 's coming from a really cool place because it got this groundswell from SXSW. What was it like premiering the movie out there and getting that work done ahead of time?

Hawke: It was awesome! The whole experience, just to be honest with you, has been really great. It was a simple movie to make. It was shot in New York. Scott is a really prepared guy, he knows exactly what he wants, and we finished the movie and got to screen it at SXSW. I've done a lot of work in Austin with Richard Linklater and had a lot of fun at the SXSW film festival and got to do kind of a Fright Night screening and have everyone love it the way they did and have the studio get so excited about the movie. It doesn't happen that often that people really get excited about something, so I don't take it for granted anymore.

MTV: When you're watching something like that, are you too close to have it scare you?

Hawke: Yeah, I just laughed the whole time. I just laughed hysterically the whole time.

MTV: Everything's just like a memory of being on set, I imagine.

Hawke: No, I love watching it work on an audience, watching things that were created so deliberately have their effect.

MTV: So you're in on it a bit. I get that.

Hawke: I feel like I'm one of the puppet masters, you know. Watching when people scream kind of makes you laugh because you know there's no bogeyman.

[Duramou]

La note sur IMDB est passée de 7,6 pour 500 votes à 7,8 pour 710 votes.

De nouvelles critiques (bonnes) ont été publiées.

[Duramou]

[phoenlx]

Les affiches se démarquent de pas mal d'autres en tout cas c'est une bonne chose ( je déteste les affiches trop classiques )

[Duramou]

Elles ne sont pas mal en effet.
Le film est toujours aussi bien côté par les quelque 900 personnes qui ont vu et noté le film. 7.7/10 en moyenne

[Duramou]

Parce qu'il est produit par un tandem gagnant du film d'horreur (Jason Blum et Brian Kavanaugh, qui ont oeuvré en vrac sur la trilogie Paranormal Activity, Insidious, Area 51, Skyline, Safe et The Bay), parce qu'il dispose d'une tête d'affiche au capital sympathie énorme (Ethan Hawke, toujours parfait) et parce que sa première bande-annonce nous a grave filé les chocottes, Sinister est un film qui s'annonce sous les meilleurs auspices. Aujourd'hui, ce n'est pas un, ni deux, mais bien trois trailers de ce film que nous vous proposons, histoire de maintenir le buzz autour de cette bobine très attendue par les fans du genre. On commence donc avec la première bande-annonce officielle française, en VOST, concoctée par Wild Bunch Distribution en vue de la sortie du film programmée pour le 7 novembre prochaine.

http://cinema.jeuxactu.com/news-siniste ... -18984.htm

[phoenlx]

j'espère que ce ne sont pas de sinistres coup de pubs pour rien ; plutôt étrange toute la promo sur ce film, ça me rend curieux mais en même temps méfiant

[Duramou]

Oui, moi aussi !
Quoique les notes des spectateurs sur IMDB ne baissent pas ; c'est très bon signe.
Néanmoins, j'attends le 5 octobre pour avoir un avis plus tranché.

Je sais, je me répète mais bon...

[Duramou]

PLOT: A struggling writer and his family move into a house where a horrific murder took place almost a year ago. The writer, on a quest to rediscover his past success, attempts to solve the mystery of the murder, but there is an evil force at play that he's not at all prepared to face.

REVIEW: It needn't be put off or built up, so let's get to it: SINISTER is a truly great horror movie; a dread-filled, flat-out scary shocker that's like a clinic on how to jolt an audience into grim submission. Not content to be a simple Halloween-season diversion, SINISTER lives up to its title, and then some, by delivering a relentless series of unnerving sequences filled with ominous images and haunting ideas. Director Scott Derrickson clearly intends to populate your nightmares with visions of SINISTER's merciless antagonist for a long time, and he rather handily succeeds. SINISTER is going to f*ck up a lot of people.



It is safe to say that Derrickson's resume did not lead me to believe that he was capable of the morbid power SINISTER holds. Derrickson's highlights include the courtroom drama/possession thriller THE EXORCISM OF EMILY ROSE and the unfortunate DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL remake, starring a more-bored-than-ever Keanu Reeves. Seemingly on his way to Director Jail for good, Derrickson has detoured drastically and conjured up this suspenseful and disturbing film which is destined to become a genuine modern-day horror classic - and that's no hyperbole.

What's particularly jostling about SINISTER's ability to crawl under the skin is its rather mundane set-up. Ethan Hawke stars as Ellison, a true-crime novelist trying desperately to recapture the fame and glory achieved too many years ago with his first book. Still vain but undoubtedly humbled by his uneven track record, Ellison craftily moves his family into the house once belonging to a slaughtered family; a mother, father and two children were hung from the front yard's tree branch, while the youngest daughter is missing. We quickly learn Ellison has, in the past, had no compunction about relocating his entire family to a new town to be closer to a juicy story, but this latest move is so inordinately creepy that he doesn't even tell his wife. For Ellison, getting to the bottom of this particular mystery means the revival of his career, and what his wife and two children don't know won't hurt them. This is what Ellison thinks.



After squaring away much of the house and setting up a comfy office, Ellison discovers a box in the attic. The box contains several home movies, shot on 8mm, all labeled rather innocuously with titles like, 'Family BBQ" and "Lawn Work." The content, however, isn't so harmless: each film depicts the gruesome murder of a family at the hands of an unknown assailant. Not only has Ellison found a document of the disposal of the people whose house he currently inhabits, but he now finds himself with a handful of unsolved killings on his hands. Sick stuff indeed, but it incites a dormant passion in the author, who proceeds to investigate with a renewed fervor.

Without giving too much away, let's say that Ellison's investigation leads to the disquieting revelation that each family has a tenuous connection to one another. And the murders themselves, ritualistic in nature, appear to be perpetrated by a white-faced demon known as Bagul, whose ghostly visage can be seen in each piece of evidence. Murder is only part of what Bagul's business is, as Ellison is soon to find out.

Okay, you might think, so it's PARANORMAL ACTIVITY meets THE RING; cue the predictable jump-scares, sickly-looking ghost children and passe found-footage. But SINISTER inhabits a world of its own, impressively enough. You'll be hard-pressed to compare it to anything else offhand, but that could be because SINISTER's subject matter is dark in a profound way unusual for the supernatural genre nowadays. Derrickson's found-footage contains some really ghastly visuals, and the general atmosphere of the picture is one of palpable disquiet, but what's really terrifying (as is true with all the great horror films) is what you don't see. The ideas that your brain soaks up along SINISTER's ghoulish path are sure to chill you to your bones, as the story taps into some very primal fears that burrow far deeper than an easy jump-scare..



Perhaps Derrickson's most impressive feat is the way he keeps a noose tightened around his audience throughout, barely breaking the considerable tension with scenes of exposition. We rarely get a break from having our nerves jangled, which can be quite exhausting, but it's undeniably refreshing to experience a horror movie that so effortlessly compels us and terrorizes us in equal measure. It's like sitting on the edge of your seat and being pinned back to it at the same time. He has reinvented himself as a director to keep an eye on; it shall be very interesting to find out what's next for him. (A SINISTER sequel is, despite the film's bleak conclusion, definitely feasible.

Ethan Hawke is, as ever, a reliably engrossing screen presence; Ellison is in almost every single scene of the film, so without a strong performer inhabiting him, the film wouldn't work on a human level, no matter how scary it is. It's to Derrickson and co-writer C. Robert Cargill's credit that they make Ellison a rather flawed person: he drinks too much when under pressue, he lies to his family and the police, he's consumed with popularity and his own ego. Hawke captures the man's likable persistence as much as his somewhat pathetic yearning for prestige. It's a really splendid performance.

However, Bagul (or Mr. Boogie, as he's "affectionately" known) is the movie's real scene-stealer; his brief appearances are disorienting and effective, and the more susceptible audience members will be seeing his face long after they leave the theater. He could be the next major horror franchise villain, and as is usually the case, his ability to scare will likely dissipate after a few installments, but currently he's the most fearsome creation in the movies.

[Duramou]

Scott Derrickson’s Sinister debuted at Frightfest earlier this year, and since then has already gained something of a reputation as one of the most unforgivingly terrifying films of the year. The screening to which Bleeding Cool was invited was being filmed as part of a “psychological experiment on the effects of watching horror movies”, with several audience members hooked up to wires and electrodes in order to monitor how sweaty and excited they were. So, does Sinister live up to this hype?

The film follows the family life and career of a non-fiction crime writer called Ellison, who broke into relative fame in his younger days with a book that uncovered facts about a murder that the local police force had missed, thereby securing justice for the perpetrator. After several failed follow-ups, Ellison is determined to solve a brutal multiple murder and, unbeknowst to his wife, moves his entire family into the house where the murders took place in order to better conduct his research. Almost immediately he finds a box of old Super 8 “home movies” in the attic, which actually contain footage of increasingly brutal and horrifying murders that have taken place over the years. This is one gift horse that Ellison should almost definitely look in the child-chomping mouth, but instead he sees the films as the key to making his comeback.

From the synopsis, it’s easy to expect a haunted house tale reminiscent of The Amityville Horror or perhaps The Shining from Sinister, but in fact the closest point of comparison for the film is probably online series Marble Hornets – a no-budget, DV-shot found footage soap opera based on a Something Awful-born urban legend. Like Marble Hornets, Sinister gives only the smallest fractal glimpses of its monster: just enough to make you want to draw all the curtains in your house at night and, if possible, start sleeping in your closet with the door barricaded.

Sinister is mercilessly, sadistically frightening, the kind of film that greedy heirs might show their frail-hearted elderly relatives if they wanted to pull off the perfect murder. The jump scares are hit and miss, since every carefully constructed and perfectly executed jump has an evil twin in the form of a lazy door slam or random bump in the attic. Most of the fear factor, however, cames from the glimpses of the monster, which are just enough to make you very certain that you don’t want to see it any closer up, from the oppressiveness of the setting (the film takes place mostly at night), and from the steady ratcheting of tension as more and more is revealed about the previous murders. It would be fair to say that the jump scares are employed as a crutch, but only in the sense that they’re used to beat you further when you’re already a quivering heap on the floor. One of these scares in particular had me literally about to leave the theatre for good until I remembered that professional obligation required me to stay.

Judging horror films is a tricky beast, since for pure scare value Sinister is near-perfect, but outside of the monsters and murdered children it’s not a particularly outstanding drama. Ethan Hawke provides a convincing portrayal of a man making terrible decisions out of a hunger for the fame and success that he once had, but the family interactions and arguments often feel stilted and messy. There is a lack of chemistry between Hawke and co-star Juliet Rylance – who puts in an only passable peformance as Ellison’s wife, Tracy – that makes it difficult to invest much in either of their characters. An honourable mention, however, should be given to scene-stealer and audience favourite James Ransone, who plays an awkwardly adoring fan of Ellison’s known only as ‘Deputy So-and-So’. Regrettably, Sinister also falls apart somewhat in the last half-hour, with the plot becoming steadily more predictable and some not-scary-at-all supporting ghouls coming in to do background dancing for the main star.

If the ultimate test of a horror movie is just how psychologically disturbed the audience is by the end of it, then Sinister delivers on every level. It’s a skilfully crafted house of horrors with a decent story at its centre, and definitely one of the stand-out scare flicks of the last few years.

4,5/5

[Duramou]